Trump says talks with China 'going well'

That meeting was needed for him and Xi Jinping to discuss and agree on some of the long-standing and more difficult points, the US President said in remarks posted to his personal account on social media platform Twitter.

He was speaking ahead of a meeting with top Chinese leaders and representatives in the Oval office scheduled for later on Thursday.

Trump also appeared to indicate that a deal was possible before the 1 March deadline for America's 10% tariff on $200bn-worth of Chinese-made goods to be hiked to 25%.

The comments from the US President were followed by a report in the Journal according to which Beijing was hoping that another face-to-face meeting between the two leaders would allow the two sides to reach a solution because, according to people briefed on the matter, a wide gap remained between the two economic giants.

Commenting on what investors might expect from the latest round of trade talks, Mickey Levy at Berenberg Capital Markets told clients: "The Chinese and U.S. delegations are not naïve. They fully understand the importance of the meetings—the positives that would stem from the public perception that progress is being made, and the potential negatives if higher tariffs were to be imposed.

"In light of the comprehensiveness of the issues under debate, it seems unlikely that a comprehensive agreement will be reached by the end of this week’s meetings. On the other hand, it seems likely that the meetings will be concluded with some kind of announcement—formal or otherwise--that the negotiations have made progress on many of the more straightforward tariff and trade flow issues under discussion. Stay tuned."